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Rural School Leaflet 



The mud daubers, Solitary wasps 



There are many kinds of wasps. In general they belong to two groups, 

 the Solitary and the Social. The Solitary wasps are so called because 



each family lives by itself; that 

 is, the mother wasp makes a 

 -^ nest for her young in the spring 

 and only the members of one 

 family grow up together. The 

 mud daubers, the mason wasps, 

 the carpenter wasps, and the 

 digger wasps are all Solitary. 

 Their wings when closed lie 

 folded across the back. 



The mud dauber may be 

 used to illustrate the habits of 

 the Solitary wasps. She is a 

 black, slender creature with 

 blue-purple, iridescent wings, 

 and is very common in New 

 York State. She builds her nest of mud, which she finds in puddles and 

 on muddy roadsides. She collects a pellet of mud in her jaws and by 

 mixing it with saliva changes it to cement. She plasters these soft 

 pellets under the roof-boards of some shed or garret. She has to 

 make many trips in building a cell, which needs to be an inch long and 

 perhaps a half inch in width. The walls are about one eighth of an 

 inch thick; and, while the outside may be rough, the inside is very 

 smooth. When one of these tubes is finished except for an opening 

 left at one end, the mud dauber changes her labors and starts off spider- 

 hunting. As soon as she sees a spider hanging snugly in its web she 

 pounces down on it and stings 

 it at just the right place in its 

 nervous system to paralyze it 

 but not to kill it. In her jaws 

 she carries the helpless spider to 

 her nest and packs it into the 

 far end. Then she goes for 

 more spiders until the nest is 

 fairly full; and then she lays her 

 egg in the cell and walls it up, 

 spiders, egg, and all. From the 

 egg hatches a white grub, for 

 the young of all wasps are grub-like creatures. The little grub starts in 

 at once to eat the helpless spiders and eats heartily, like most young 



A mason wasp 



